Hansen’s ‘Game Over for the Climate’ op-ed

This op-ed appeared in the New York Times today, and since it was written by a government employee, using his NASA title at the end of the article, I consider it a public domain work reproducible here. I see what Hansen is saying here as giving license to the McKibbenites for more protests, more rallies, and since Hansen has endorsed it, likely some civil disobedience or perhaps even criminal activities to block Canada’s sovereign right to develop their own resources. I suspect we’ll see a rebuttal or two in the NYT perhaps as an op-ed or at least some letters, and I encourage WUWT readers to make use of that option. – Anthony

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By James Hansen

GLOBAL warming isn’t a prediction. It is happening. That is why I was so troubled to read a recent interview with President Obama in Rolling Stone in which he said that Canada would exploit the oil in its vast tar sands reserves “regardless of what we do.”

If Canada proceeds, and we do nothing, it will be game over for the climate.

Canada’s tar sands, deposits of sand saturated with bitumen, contain twice the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by global oil use in our entire history. If we were to fully exploit this new oil source, and continue to burn our conventional oil, gas and coal supplies, concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere eventually would reach levels higher than in the Pliocene era, more than 2.5 million years ago, when sea level was at least 50 feet higher than it is now. That level of heat-trapping gases would assure that the disintegration of the ice sheets would accelerate out of control. Sea levels would rise and destroy coastal cities. Global temperatures would become intolerable. Twenty to 50 percent of the planet’s species would be driven to extinction. Civilization would be at risk.

That is the long-term outlook. But near-term, things will be bad enough. Over the next several decades, the Western United States and the semi-arid region from North Dakota to Texas will develop semi-permanent drought, with rain, when it does come, occurring in extreme events with heavy flooding. Economic losses would be incalculable. More and more of the Midwest would be a dust bowl. California’s Central Valley could no longer be irrigated. Food prices would rise to unprecedented levels.

If this sounds apocalyptic, it is. This is why we need to reduce emissions dramatically. President Obama has the power not only to deny tar sands oil additional access to Gulf Coast refining, which Canada desires in part for export markets, but also to encourage economic incentives to leave tar sands and other dirty fuels in the ground.

The global warming signal is now louder than the noise of random weather, as I predicted would happen by now in the journal Science in 1981. Extremely hot summers have increased noticeably. We can say with high confidence that the recent heat waves in Texas and Russia, and the one in Europe in 2003, which killed tens of thousands, were not natural events — they were caused by human-induced climate change.

We have known since the 1800s that carbon dioxide traps heat in the atmosphere. The right amount keeps the climate conducive to human life. But add too much, as we are doing now, and temperatures will inevitably rise too high. This is not the result of natural variability, as some argue. The earth is currently in the part of its long-term orbit cycle where temperatures would normally be cooling. But they are rising — and it’s because we are forcing them higher with fossil fuel emissions.

The concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has risen from 280 parts per million to 393 p.p.m. over the last 150 years. The tar sands contain enough carbon — 240 gigatons — to add 120 p.p.m. Tar shale, a close cousin of tar sands found mainly in the United States, contains at least an additional 300 gigatons of carbon. If we turn to these dirtiest of fuels, instead of finding ways to phase out our addiction to fossil fuels, there is no hope of keeping carbon concentrations below 500 p.p.m. — a level that would, as earth’s history shows, leave our children a climate system that is out of their control.

We need to start reducing emissions significantly, not create new ways to increase them. We should impose a gradually rising carbon fee, collected from fossil fuel companies, then distribute 100 percent of the collections to all Americans on a per-capita basis every month. The government would not get a penny. This market-based approach would stimulate innovation, jobs and economic growth, avoid enlarging government or having it pick winners or losers. Most Americans, except the heaviest energy users, would get more back than they paid in increased prices. Not only that, the reduction in oil use resulting from the carbon price would be nearly six times as great as the oil supply from the proposed pipeline from Canada, rendering the pipeline superfluous, according to economic models driven by a slowly rising carbon price.

But instead of placing a rising fee on carbon emissions to make fossil fuels pay their true costs, leveling the energy playing field, the world’s governments are forcing the public to subsidize fossil fuels with hundreds of billions of dollars per year. This encourages a frantic stampede to extract every fossil fuel through mountaintop removal, longwall mining, hydraulic fracturing, tar sands and tar shale extraction, and deep ocean and Arctic drilling.

President Obama speaks of a “planet in peril,” but he does not provide the leadership needed to change the world’s course. Our leaders must speak candidly to the public — which yearns for open, honest discussion — explaining that our continued technological leadership and economic well-being demand a reasoned change of our energy course. History has shown that the American public can rise to the challenge, but leadership is essential.

The science of the situation is clear — it’s time for the politics to follow. This is a plan that can unify conservatives and liberals, environmentalists and business. Every major national science academy in the world has reported that global warming is real, caused mostly by humans, and requires urgent action. The cost of acting goes far higher the longer we wait — we can’t wait any longer to avoid the worst and be judged immoral by coming generations.

James Hansen directs the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and is the author of “Storms of My Grandchildren.”

208 thoughts on “Hansen’s ‘Game Over for the Climate’ op-ed”

I do not comment here as a rule, but I read this in The Times this morning and searched in vain for the “comments” icon to leave a note expressing exactly what I think of the deplorable conduct of this public servant. It is as astonishing as it is mendacious.

What a pathetic article. He’s basically saying we haven’t even used up half of the available oil. Great news!

I wonder how long the alarmists will carry on citing the 2003 heatwave in Europe as evidence of ‘weather noise’ having increased. He should get out more and perhaps read a few old newspapers to realize that with no heatwave in Europe for 9 years and no landfalling hurricane on the US east coast for 5 years, the ‘weather noise’ is decreasing not increasing.

The following site has a number of references to bad weather in the last 2 centuries as recorded in old newspapers:

As an engineer, I find the comment that, “If Canada proceeds, and we do nothing, it will be game over for the climate” completely observably false. We are far less in control than we’d like to think. It’s painful to see this. Oooff.

We can say with high confidence that the recent heat waves in Texas and Russia, and the one in Europe in 2003, which killed tens of thousands, were not natural events — they were caused by human-induced climate change.

Wait… Didn’t I read several peer reviewed papers that said those events WERE NOT caused by climate change but had natural meteorological causes??????

The science is clear and it’s time for the politics to follow? What kind of double or twisted speak is that? Is the man delusional or the mad scientist plotting with others to take over the world, while making a tidy sum in the process or believing in the infallibility his own thoughts ideas he continues his course. My guess is some real crazy mix of all the above.

It’s the basic arrogance that the human race has any control over climate that has got us into this AGW mess. A little humility would go a long way. Maybe then we can admit we don’t know, we don’t control and we can’t “fix” — even if it were broken.

Does anyone take this daft old codger seriously? As usual he makes sweeping statements with no evidence at all e.g. 20%-50% of species will become extinct. How would he know since he has no knowledge of biology whatsoever! I find it incredible that anyone would believe any of his rantings.

It is said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing more than once and expecting a different result. I think a corollary to that is the tendency to increase the extremity of one’s predictions when all previous, less extreme predictions, have failed to materialise.

If this man’s projections had any validity whatsoever, New York would, Today, be under 1 meter of water already! Clearly, his projections are utterly bogus! With a track record in being wrong like his, why on earth does anyone pay any attention to him at all. And by wrong, I do not mean ordinary, mistaken kind of wrong, but catastrophically and world record breakingly wrong.

He still is beating the dead horse. And when his apocalyptic predictions fail to come to pass, he will adjust the model, and make more of them. Kind of like the preacher who predicted the rapture twice last year.

So, Canada has twice as much energy as has been used in all history, and the U.S. has more than that. That’s great news. Now how is it possible to tax the oil companies and distribute the proceeds so that everybody gets more than the spend in higher prices? Great stuff this CO2, it prints money as well!

What I got out of this article:
1. The end is near!
2. The illusion of control.
3. Targeted redistribution of wealth.
4. Incentives toward antagonizing our own government and our sovereign ally.
5. Abuse of power (position), shouting desperation.

These are the ravings of a fanatic, claiming we lack conviction, and shall be punished for our ways if we do not repent and act soon.

We can say with high confidence that the recent heat waves in Texas and Russia, and the one in Europe in 2003, which killed tens of thousands, were not natural events — they were caused by human-induced climate change.

Really? Maybe that has been peer-reviewed and published and I have missed it. Might that be unsupported conjecture? Might that have happened before in the recent past?

1) the level of water from 500ppm is completely unknown. Just because co2 was the same at a different time doesn’t mean Thayer will have the same sea level. Other factors caused the heating then and other unknown caused the conditions and the feedback and contribution of co2 is unknown.

2) it will take thousands or millions of years to have this kind of sea level change. Considering that we have only had technology for 150 years or so and civilization for a few thousand. Almost all buildings are less than 100 years old. Higher temperatures would mean some areas would be more livable and more arable and others would be covered in ocean. We have thousands of years to adjust.
3) the environment has been through far more than 500ppm co2. It doesn’t spell the “end” of the environment, of life on earth or even anything negative at all. Life evolved in warmer conditions for most of the history of the earth. There is no evidence that today is better for life or the earth than earlier higher temperatures.

I don’t know why people keep using the image where Hansen is getting arrested. Wouldn’t you think he’s proud of that? He’s standing up to the man, engaging in civil disobedience. It’s not a source of shame for him.

Tar shale? Last I saw we have “tar sands” also known as bitumen or very heavily aged oil and we have “oil shale” also known as Kerogen or oil that has’nt aged enough to really be oil. Maybe he does’nt like tight oil from the Bakken or Eagle Ford. I dont know but I’d love to know what he drives, how he travels everywhere, how he heats and cools his home, how he spends is wealth from all his talks. I babble too long.

Ah! Hansen wants to be terminated. He wants to be a martyr to the Cause, just as David Suzuki sees himself as one after he was “forced” to quit as a director of his own foundation, The David Suzuki Foundation, so he could speak his mind without having to admit his Foundation was a political-social advocacy, not a charity.

I predict: Hansen will use his NASA affiliation until, like Salinger in New Zealand, he is told to cease using his position to promote his private work or get out. Well, get out with this big paycheck. Which he will do, wailing all the way to the bank about being muzzled by a criminally apathetic President.

What is bizarre is that Hansen can say these apocalyptic things and yet never fear having to prove them real. But does a prophet have to? Ask Gore, but, then, Gore doesn’t take questions.

I’ve said it before. We do not have to fear the catastrophe but the catastrophists.

Last week I was told that the C in CAGW was purely a sceptic’s term and that no scientist had used the word catastrophic. Now that ‘apocalyptic’ has been uttered for the first time by a real scientist can I use the term AAGW?
AARGH!

The Canadians should ask whether this is the official line of NASA, that is to openly interfere with the democratic decisions of a free and sovereign nation, and thus the official stance taken by the US government, as NASA is a federal institution. If it is not, then they should ask for Hansen to apologise or resign and continue his politics as a private citizen.

“We should impose a gradually rising carbon fee, collected from fossil fuel companies, then distribute 100 percent of the collections to all Americans on a per-capita basis every month. The government would not get a penny. This market-based approach would stimulate innovation, jobs and economic growth, avoid enlarging government or having it pick winners or losers. Most Americans, except the heaviest energy users, would get more back than they paid in increased prices.”

What?

“This market-based approach”?

What? Now he’s an economist?

I think “barking mad” is dead on, and I look forward to the rebuttals of this .

He’s already promised us ten feet of sea level rise for our first 100 ppm co2, now he’s going for broke with a 50 foot rise for the next 100 ppm.
When I see some evidence for his first ten feet, which should be soon as we are more than half way there now, I’ll start to worry about the next 50 feet.

I look outside and realize all the plants are now green and we can thank CO2. Now, I’m going out on a limb here, but I suspect this local panorama is being replicated world-wide. So bring on the CO2–we are seeing the benefits everywhere. (Doesn’t hurt if the Earth is just a tad bit warmer and wetter, too.)

Is this what was meant to be said, very near the beginning of the article:
“Canada’s tar sands, deposits of sand saturated with bitumen, contain twice the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by global oil use in our entire history.”

Surely, if the tar sands contained all that carbon dioxide, there wouldn’t be that much combustion left to do.

“Extremely hot summers have increased noticeably” – and, ladies and gentlemen, today in Scotland it is around 8 degrees C and snow is forecast in the Highlands!! Every year here seems to be getting colder – and talking of weather weirdness, check out today’s BBC Scotland forecaster – http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-18022243

“If Canada proceeds, and we do nothing, it will be game over for the climate.”
YEEEEEEEEEAH! Let’s start pushing Canada around. Step aside Hillary – let a MAN show you how this foreign policy stuff is done. They need to been shown who the Be**tch in this relationship is.
So, Hansen’s not only a scientist, he’s a foreign policy expert now? He’s off to a wonderful start, clearly using the South Park doctrine, Blame Canada.

I agree with Tim Walker when he writes that it is time for the politicians to change. But before that the media must change, especially the BBC. Time for the captive subscribers to revolt? Also, government `scientific` advisers must change. Surely they know that the media, WWF etc are taking them for a ride? Or is it too comfortable a spot to leave? The public at large sense that they are being conned but they need more and better information. Who is doing this?

This man has somehow gained access to temperature records in a national archive. He is allowed to alter them and publish the altered results, and does so to promote his alarmist advocate views. He is a major reason why huge sums of “what used to be our money” are wasted on Green causes, windmills, solar, hybrid cars, absurd job-killing regulations from EPA, huge and expensive government programs that achieve nothing, and on and on. All the while the emerging economies in Asia and South America go right on building coal-fired power plants, and gaining prosperity, good for them. Hansen gets headlines, but no one in mass media calls him out as the false prophet he is.

He’s been saying ‘It will be game over if X happens’ for 30 years. Trouble is, X has happened several times and the game always continues.

The game will only be over when his budget is zeroed. Unfortunately no American politician has the necessary pair of organs to accomplish that, so Hansen’s budget will never be cut or even held constant, let alone zeroed. He will always get MORE MORE MORE MORE MORE.

Face it, the 1776 revolution was a terrible idea. Canada works, we don’t.

“Canada’s tar sands, deposits of sand saturated with bitumen, contain twice the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by global oil use in our entire history.”
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This from Wikipedia so take it for what its worth.

Oil sands have been in production since 1967. 44% of Canadian oil production in 2007 was from oil sands.

Production costs are “around $27 per barrel of synthetic crude oil despite rising energy and labour costs”. “About two tons of oil sands are required to produce one barrel (roughly 1/8 of a ton) of oil.”

Canada reserves recoverable with current technology: “amount to 97% of Canadian oil reserves and 75% of total North American petroleum reserves”; approximately 176.8 billion barrels.

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How can 176.8 billion barrels “contain twice the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by global oil use in our entire history”?

and

What percentage of the oil is, never converted to fuel, used for other products?

I think it’s time we start putting some pressure on NASA to acknowledge whether he speaks for them or not. Take 5 minutes and write them an email and object to this rat bastards public pontifications. NASA needs to do something about him.

Anthony, I’ve sent the NYT’s and the Public Editor’s office perhaps a dozen letters in all , and all
I got were crickets. I’m a published essayist, so I can guarantee you it wasn’t the quality of the writing. Letters on this subject have to come from credentialed scientists, otherwise they go into
the “wingnut” file. As to an opposing Op-Ed, I’ll eat my hat if they publish one, though it would be my pleasure if it comes to pass.

Wow, we Canadians are now the single biggest threat to the planet. It’s bad enough that we inflicted Justin Bieber and Pam Anderson on the world, now we trump Iranian nuclear threat, North Korea, a $15 trillion debt and Islamic terrorism combined

Hanson wrote: “President Obama speaks of a “planet in peril,” but he does not provide the leadership needed to change the world’s course……. History has shown that the American public can rise to the challenge, but leadership is essential.”
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Freedom of speech is fine but someone using their status as a senior government employee seems to be insinuating hostility towards the US President in an election year. Can Hanson be entirely sane?

Does anyone take this daft old codger seriously? As usual he makes sweeping statements with no evidence at all e.g. 20%-50% of species will become extinct. How would he know since he has no knowledge of biology whatsoever!
<<

He probably gets his claim from E.O. Wilson: “Dr. Edward O. Wilson, a Harvard biologist who variously claims that 4,000, 30,000, or 50,000 species are lost each year.”

Wilson claims his species-area curve has been verified by hundreds of independent studies; however we have the following:

In the eastern United States, for example, during the first 300 years of European settlement, woodlands were broken up into fragments, none larger than 1 to 2 percent of the original vast forest, but only three forest birds became extinct–the carolina parakeet, the passenger pigeon, and the ivory-billed woodpecker. Moreover, habitat loss probably did not play the major role in their demise: The parakeet and the pigeon were hunted to death. (Budiansky, Stephen. “The Doomsday Myths,” U.S. News and World Report, December 13, 1993, p. 82)

“That level of heat-trapping gases would assure that the disintegration of the ice sheets would accelerate out of control. ”
I guess as of now, we humans still fully control this disintegration.
More drought-floods: “Texas will develop semi-permanent drought, with rain, when it does come, occurring in extreme events with heavy flooding.”
“We can say with high confidence that the recent heat waves in Texas and Russia, and the one in Europe in 2003, which killed tens of thousands, were not natural events”
Here he refers to what must be empirical evidence; yet no citation.
“Food prices would rise to unprecedented levels.”
This is already true thanks to corn ethanol. In the US we don’t feel it as much as poorer nations do
“the world’s governments are forcing the public to subsidize fossil fuels with hundreds of billions of dollars per year.” Purely untrue. Why would a highly profitable business need subsidy?
“we can’t wait any longer to avoid the worst and be judged immoral by coming generations.”
Too late. A 15 TRILLION dollar national shame, er, debt has already rendered us absolutely immoral towards future generations.
” If this sounds apocalyptic, it is.” So said Chicken Little.

Aw come on admit it you Americans have always wanted to invade Canada and now you have an excuse as good as any weapons of mass destruction that Saddam might have had, Hansen’s Tar Sands…oh the horror…

All these lies are like crying “Fire!” in a crowded theater when no fire is present. IIRC, there are laws against such things.

I call on all cartoonists and comedians to lampoon these AGW cultists at every opportunity. Make it clear what liars and hypocrites and opportunitists they are, and how deserving of scorn and ostracism.

As for saying the government could collect these new excise taxes and not retain a penny – what buffoonery! You can bet your bottom dollar that anything the government runs will simply serve as a funnel for driving more into government coffers and less back to the people.

It would be a shame to abandon vast carbon neutral oil resources in Saudi Arabia while pumping dirty Canadian stuff across the border. Therefore the border has to be be eradicated.

The US should send a liberation army to Canada as soon as practicable. It was a failure in 1812, admittedly, but this time it would be entirely different. For one Great Britain neither have the power nor the will any more to bomb Baltimore, occupy Washington, eat the President’s dinner, shit all over the White House then set it on fire. And the enslaved Canadians would cheer invading US troops on the streets instead of a pathetic reenactment of past armed resistance.

robroy – one day a year they don’t ululate for mohammed – on that day they use their satellites to track santa claus. gotta make sure the kids grow up believing in an omniscient distributor of causeless wealth – otherwise they won’t be prepared to accept more preposterous notions as adults.

Looks to me that James Hansen should receive Euro and Australian carbon credits in place of a salary and that his retirement fund should also be converted to Euro and Australian carbon credits. From his viewpoint, he should think it a wonderful investment. If he fights converting his pay to carbon credits, well perhaps his CAGW faith is not a real as he’d like us to think…

Aw come on admit it you Americans have always wanted to invade Canada and now you have an excuse as good as any weapons of mass destruction that Saddam might have had, Hansen’s Tar Sands…oh the horror…
__________________

Hudson: That’s it man, game over man, game over! What the **** are we gonna do now? What are we gonna do?
Burke: Maybe we could build a fire, sing a couple of songs, huh? Why don’t we try that?
Hansen: A fire? That will be 50 cents carbon tax, please. (But don’t worry. I’ll split it up and give it back to you later. Promise!)

“Wow, we Canadians are now the single biggest threat to the planet. It’s bad enough that we inflicted Justin Bieber and Pam Anderson on the world, now we trump Iranian nuclear threat, North Korea, a $15 trillion debt and Islamic terrorism combined”

It’s much worse than you thought!

You forgot Celine Dion. Her voice can make CO2 molecules scream in pain.

beesaman says:
May 10, 2012 at 10:11 am
Aw come on admit it you Americans have always wanted to invade Canada and now you have an excuse as good as any weapons of mass destruction that Saddam might have had, Hansen’s Tar Sands…oh the horror…

Yes!! You are a wretched, vile, and villianous people, deserving of every calamity you can be brought to suffer and….and…oh, hang on, you’ve got New Democrats and Liberals to contend with; never mind.

Now you know why they are CO2 Climate Doomsday Rapture Soothsdayers. They never tire of crying wolf.

‎”If this sounds apocalyptic, it is.” – Dr. James Hansen

He even admits to being a doomsday rapturist!

Notice that he never provides any evidence that CO2 “causes” Temperature rise in the real atmosphere, he just assumes it. That’s skipping over a rather essential step known as the scientific method where you have to prove what you claim in a way such that other scientists can independently verify your alleged evidence, analysis, and conclusions – OR falsify them.

Mother Nature has falsified all the climate models and predictions including Hansen’s 1981 “prognostications of doom”.

Oh, and where is the so called “model” used in this 1981 doomsday prophecy of Hansen’s? If that model worked so well why did he drop it for the models used in his later predictions?

It should also be noted that with all the “data fabrication manipulations” done on the GISTEMP records it’s no wonder that they might match one of Hansen’s many different predictions. Not to mention Hansen’s paper that authorized the use of 1200km radius circles around a single therometer to fabricate Arctic, Asian, and Africian temperature data artifically elevating them to support his doomsday hypothesis. Hansen’s house of cards is built layer upon layer using data fabrication and statements that are half truths (e.g. “global warming is happening” – sure it’s warmer today than in 1880 but that’s not proof of CO2 causing such warmth) and blatant data fabrication fraud. Time to pull out the underpinings of his claims.

Time to have him Hansen arrested for data fabrication fraud (GISTEMP manipulation data fabrication fraud and the 1200km radius data fabrication fraud) and financial fraud that has resulted from those sceintific frauds (receiving grant monies). Yes, proving it in a court of law will take building up a case against him. With “op-ed” pieces like the above written by Hansen himself he is just making it easier to make the case against him. It’s time to start making the legal case against Hansen.

“Aw come on admit it you Americans have always wanted to invade Canada and now you have an excuse as good as any weapons of mass destruction that Saddam might have had, Hansen’s Tar Sands…oh the horror”

Americans don’t want to invade Canada, as we would then be stuck with the French.

Any rebuttal Op-Ed should include a list of predictions from Hansen from the 80’s that the timing of which has either already passed or is very near to pass.

Lettuce note that us ‘merikens downhere ain’t had a good history of tryin’ to invade them there northern types….. Northern half of de US country, northern half of de US continent. Ain’t none of them there invasions worked too good. Better to let them keep their hokey and cold and ice up there, and jest send all the oil downhill.

And the last time we done did invade south, we ended up payin’ even more after the peace treaty fer the territory we done already own because of the invasion!

Seems he hasn’t read the IPCC’s SREX, which suggests that we may not have any warming for as long as 30 more years. That pesky multi-decadal oscillation too which he always ignores. How is it, too, that he can never seem to find the long 0.5+/- warming trend which has been in place since before 1850. His own recent work on ocean warming (using recent ocean data) shows just 0.16C by 2100 from the energy imbalance (as was examined here at WUWT).

I almost feel badly for ol’ Jim – but in the end you cannot, NASA needs to establish that they are not James Hansen and are relevant.

… Over the next several decades, the Western United States and the semi-arid region from North Dakota to Texas will develop semi-permanent drought, with rain, when it does come, occurring in extreme events with heavy flooding.

On Yahoo Canada blog, a fellow named Andy Radia from Canadian politics, in his desire to be a good apologist, somehow got it much more right than he hoped to, read till the end:

“A prominent NASA scientist penned a provocative column in the New York Times Thursday, suggesting the end of civilization could be nigh, thanks to Alberta’s ‘tar sands.’
“Global warming isn’t a prediction. It is happening. That is why I was so troubled to read a recent interview with President Obama in Rolling Stone in which he said that Canada would exploit the oil in its vast tar sands reserves ‘regardless of what we do,'” climatologist James Hanson wrote.”

So now Hansen delivers his taxpayer-funded tirade minus facts, as usual. It belongs in the same category as the recent “finding” that dinosaurs’ farts caused global warming way back when. But don’t laugh. Soon his buddies will try to get red beans taken off the shelf and mandate that catalytic converters be attached to all adults’ butts. Just you watch.

So… he’s saying there is more than enough Fossil Fuel in Canada that we don’t have any energy shortages for a couple of hundred years… Nice to know that. Hey Canada! Drill and Frack, baby, Drill and Frack! We’re rootin’ for ya!

Now if we can just get our Obstructor In Chief to let some oil infrastructure be built, everything will be just dandy…

Maybe we can sell Alaska to the Canadians so we can get the oil there produced too…

“President Obama speaks of a “planet in peril,” but he does not provide the leadership needed to change the world’s course. Our leaders must speak candidly to the public — which yearns for open, honest discussion”

You are quite right Mr Hansen, we do need honest discussion not the ridiculous imagined rubbish that you keep spouting about which you refuse to allow honest discussion.
If I were President O’Bama about whom Hansen has been so disparaging I would talk to one or two more sane scientists who refute Hansen’s apocolyptic ramblings, and himself have the courage to openly and publicly refute Hansens ridiculous diatribe. I think he owes the people of the US to put the record straight;and ask Hansen to prove all his bogus and ridiculous statistics. He would be surprised at how much support he would get.

quote
I don’t know why people keep using the image where Hansen is getting arrested. Wouldn’t you think he’s proud of that? He’s standing up to the man, engaging in civil disobedience. It’s not a source of shame for him.
unquote

It’s to show that he’s the sort of chap who wears brown shoes with a grey suit. I mean, really! Who would be foolish enough to trust such an oik?

JF
Incidentally, while agreeing with the poster above who says that 1776 was an error, I cannot in all kindness let him apply to Her Majesty for the chance to once more submit to her gracious reign. We have this CO2-crazed thing over here called the Eu which calls the carbon shots. It’s nearly as bad as California.

By strangling the U.S. economy, President Obama may have single-handedly saved the planet. That’s the upshot of a paper recently published in the scientific journal Environmental Science & Policy by researchers from the University of Michigan and the University of Valladolid in Spain. Congratulations, Mr. President. . . .
Forcing adoption of expensive and inefficient sources of power only drags down the economy, which is exactly what global warming’s believers want. In that respect, Mr. Obama’s stimulus policy wasn’t a colossal failure after all. The massive unemployment and lackluster growth that followed his $831 billion spending spree were a smashing success, so long as one is more worried about carbon-dioxide levels than the number of lasting jobs.

Extremely hot summers have increased noticeably. We can say with high confidence that the recent heat waves in Texas and Russia, and the one in Europe in 2003, which killed tens of thousands, were not natural events — they were caused by human-induced climate change.

What about the recent deaths due to cold in Europe recently? What about the Mongolian cattle catastrophe a few years back? What about the snow in the Amazon, Tunisian sands dusted in snow this past winter and so on. Hansen likes cherries and so do I. ;-)

So
“North Dakota to Texas will develop semi-permanent drought, with rain, when it does come, occurring in extreme events with heavy flooding.”….

Well in the UK it’s already happened. According to the government we are in semi-permanent drought – and ever since it was announced earlier this year the rain has been “occurring in extreme events with heavy flooding” – almost non stop!

Words can make a lasting impression on people, and so the use of TAR sands is, I believe, carefully and craftily used. To most people, tar is that nasty, thick, stinky stuff that trapped saber toothed tigers and mastodons and gums up the works. Of course, it would be worse to burn it, than oil, right? The word invokes thoughts of black, choking smoke that would darken our skies and clog our lungs if burned. If you want to further your cause, you want to use words that make people imagine the worst. The word “tar” is perfect to create that image, especially when the person using it is a NASA scientist and loving grandfather.

The CAGW movement must have some great public relations people, and in Hansen’s case, some good lawyers.

As an amateur student of history, I seem to recall that Joe McCarthy reached this level of fanaticism back in the early 1950s during his anti-communist witch hunts. Eventually, the U.S. Senate censured him because he could not substantiate the claims he was making. This brings us to the question of Hanson and the type of witch hunt he is on against CO2. Seeing how Hanson is making no attempt to substantiate his published claims, will history repeat itself here? Will NASA have the courage and wisdom to censure or fire him? Somehow, I am not optimistic. But I would love to be proven wrong……

1. The hottest and driest summer in my lifetime was in 1976, not in the past 10 years. We haven’t had a decent summer since the millennium, to be honest.
2. The coldest winters were in the early to mid 1980s and the past 3 years. And 1962/3, 2 years before I was born. And 1947….
3. The wettest weather has been in the past few years, although that has also been punctuated with prolonged dry spells.
4. We had hardly any snow at all in NW London in the 1970s, whereas in the 1980s, at least 5 years had snow and frozen rivers.

For the ice data: I have been tracking that since 2008 and this year is the first time that the total polar ice, north and south, has been greater than the 30 year mean. Strange that if the apocalyptic warming is happening.

One of the biggest dangers of the media is to allow unfettered access to evangelists without publishing a counter-argument on the opposite page.

I’m increasingly of the opinion that the West needs some new news organisations who build a skeptical audience and seek out advertisers who aren’t interested in stories as advertorials, but accept that customers will be exposed to their brands. Clearly, payment mechanisms must reflect that and profits may preclude ‘going public’…..

Maybe it would be better if the Canucks didnt go ahead, I get a certain cache from being accused of being in the pay of ‘Big Oil’, even if its not true, it makes me feel important.
being in the pay of ‘Big Bitumen Tar sands’, well, it sounds a bit shitty really

The population in 2100 will be over 10 billion. Doubling the CO2 and increasing the temperature a degree or so will give us 50% more plant growth. This is the best chance to feed those people. The current policy of turning food into fuel is causing world unrest and what are essentially food riots. Current CO2 output levels aren’t sufficient to get the CO2 concentration that high.

We should be looking at using the methane clathrates from the arctic, and higher CO2 fossil fuels like the tar sands to reach the higher CO2 level that we need.

Vivian Krause has been writing about American financed environmentalists trying to stop the developement of Canada’s oilsands, and hinder the transport of oilsands bitumen. Certain environmental groups are trying to meddle with Canadian politics, which means they are no longer charities. And as a result, will lose their charity status

An inconvenient truth: Venezuela has more “tar” sands reserves than Canada.

This point seems to be lost on Hansen, Suzuki, the sock puppet media, etc. If they were successful in shutting down the Alberta oil sands, the Canadian expertise and equipment would just migrate south to help this paragon of democracy and environmental responsibility exploit theirs.

johanna says:
May 10, 2012 at 9:33 am
“Sad, really. I believe he did some good work early in his career. Now, he just sounds like the leader of one of those nutty end-of-the-world cults.”
==============================================================
Good work? He calculated “global warming” by assigning temperature to areas, where no temperature records existed: http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/1987/1987_Hansen_Lebedeff.pdf

The cynic in me says that this is Hansen’s signal for another batch of ignorantii to start violent protests against any form of non-“Renewable” energy production. I fully expect prior to the US election to have multiple Eco Fascist attacks on power plants, power lines, refineries, mines, and pipelines.
If you work in any of these areas, be aware. It won’t be handcuffs on the gates any longer.

Phil C says:
May 10, 2012 at 9:51 am
“Every major national science academy in the world has reported that global warming is real, caused mostly by humans, and requires urgent action.”
Anyone here care to show these academies where they are wrong?

You’re assuming that statement is true. Considering that all the other statements he makes in his op-ed are pure, unadulterated bullshit, that would be a rash assumption on your part.

“If I pay a tax, and then the tax is refunded to me each month, will that change my consumption?”
—–

If the amount you were paid back depended on how much you used, it wouldn’t.
In this case everyone gets back the same amount, regardless of how much they use, and what they pay is dependant on what they use.

Those who use little, will pay little, and their checks would exceed what they paid in.
Those who use a lot, will pay a lot, and their checks will be smaller than what they paid in.

In this scenario, a reasonable person would try to limit how much they use.

I would suggest to you all one great book, Ethical Oil by Ezra Levant. In a nutshell, Canadian oil is more ethical than oil from Iran, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Venezuela (you can see why…). Canadian enviromental laws are also more eco-friendly, capable of imporvement, which cannot be said for these other oil producing countries.

Poriwoggu says:
May 10, 2012 at 12:04 pm
What disturbs me is that skeptics don’t seem to be questioning the basic premise of AGW:
CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is too high and must be lowered

What disturbs me is that none of the warmies seem to be questioning the various Carbon Trade scams, which trade only money and by their own admission, do nothing to reduce the production of CO2. You’d think they’d be screeching like scalded cats.

But then, CO2 reduction is just a red herring — the actual target is wealth redistribution.

Of course the real reason the NYT printed this Mega-tripe at this time is that congress is close to approving the Keystone pipeline. Obama needs cover to support the upcoming veto. Since Warren Buffet dropped a 7 figure bribe on Obama to kill the pipeline, he will need a lot of camoflage in the press. Ol’ Warren recently snapped up the BN railway system. Guess how the oil gets here without the pipeline. (I bet you get it 1 guess)http://web.gbtv.com/media/video.jsp?content_id=20688683

By James Hansen
“We have known since the 1800s that carbon dioxide traps heat in the atmosphere.”
=====================================================
He forgot to say, that we had known since the experiment by professor R.W.Wood (1909), that the effect is extremely weak and can not produce any significant rise in temperature: http://www.wmconnolley.org.uk/sci/wood_rw.1909.html . Simple physics.

I personally like the part where, ‘ … not a penny will go to the government … ‘.

Huh?

Uuuhhhhhh, I must be missing something again; wouldn’t it take a bunch of “government” bureaucrats to collect the ‘taxes’, enter it into some kind a ledger, then another bunch to figure out how much ‘tax money’ would need to go to each ‘recipient’, and then another bunch to actually make it go to each ‘recipient’, then another bunch to audit the tax returns of the ‘recipients’ to make sure they paid the correct amount of income tax on the ‘tax money’ they ‘received’ … … … …

That, in-and-of-itself should prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that this individual is completely delusional, and needs to be institutionalized, ASAP.

It’s almost like he never studied thermodynamics, and fails to realize fundamental, invariant laws of the Universe.

So let me get this straight. He proposes a Carbon fee against fuel producers that then goes directly to the people. 70% of the population will get more back than they payed in (trickle down) fees. That is supposed to make them use less oil? If he can’t even get basic math right, what good is he?

As A Canadian I will take a deal to leave the oil in the ground, if Hanson and Obama pays us (Canada) the world price for our Oil, equal to the present and projected oil production to the end of the projected oil reserves = lets settle on 2000 years just to be generous to our Eco zealots Hanson, Obama, Al Gore Etc… I will give them a $10 /barrel discount on any oil left in the ground!!

MUST SEE:
Ezra Levant a great Canadian voice for freedom and sanity. He has yet another expose of dirty money tricks by the Tide Foundation US and Canada will the Canadian government finally act? We are talking About billions of dollars involved in these environmental slight of hand! See a freedom fighter on Video = great stuff

Alberta Oil Sands – Tide Foundation out of San Francisco opened up a Canadian branch Tide Foundation Canada. They obtained a tax-free charity’s number from Canadian Tax dept CRA – BUT they have developed a scam by renting out their Tax number to any company that will fight ALL industrial or Oil sands developments in Canada.
Tides Canada receives most of it monies from the US tides, then Tides Canada rents the Charity number to any organization that fights the Oil Sands, and charge them a 10% commission fee. This is not a charity endeavor but a political one. This is in contravention of the CRA (Revenue Canada) charity’s act /rules.

“We should impose a gradually rising carbon fee, collected from fossil fuel companies, then distribute 100 percent of the collections to all Americans on a per-capita basis every month.”

Besides all of the other disciplines that Dr. Hansen did not read at University, he clearly studied neither Economics nor Logic. His mooted tax would be collected by those nasty fossil fuel companies from the consumers at the bottom of the food chain – you and I. The costs of collecting that tax, and, more-so, the cost of sending dividends to me and you and all of our neighbours and countrymen, would leave a surplus, if any, of a piffling amount, and if your bank charges in your country of abode are anything like mine, you would probably tear the cheque up rather than incur the cost of banking it.

I wish that one of these scientists who believe that it is possible for a gas to be “heat trapping”, in other words an insulator, would come and demonstrate to me how I can use this magical quality of CO2, methane, or any other gas, to improve the heat retention properties of of my electric hot water geyser. The cost saving would be most welcome.

“The tar sands contain enough carbon — 240 gigatons — to add 120 p.p.m. Tar shale, a close cousin of tar sands found mainly in the United States, contains at least an additional 300 gigatons of carbon. If we turn to these dirtiest of fuels, instead of finding ways to phase out our addiction to fossil fuels, there is no hope of keeping carbon concentrations below 500 p.p.m. — a level that would, as earth’s history shows, leave our children a climate system that is out of their control.

We need to start reducing emissions significantly, not create new ways to increase them. We should impose a gradually rising carbon fee, collected from fossil fuel companies, then distribute 100 percent of the collections to all Americans on a per-capita basis every month.” – Hansen

All the Queensbury bed-wetters from the other thread should post a comment here describing their approved method to combat the continuing insanity from James Hansen, NASA employee.

For those that are new to these discussions, there are those among us that demand ‘the high moral ground’ (in their point of view, or more accurately ‘unilateral disarmament’ in the warmie point of view).

James Hansen is a high profile public servant on the taxpayer dole for many years and in my opinion is impervious to any fact. I am curious as to what purely scientific non-aggressive approach will persuade his ilk.

“All the Queensbury bed-wetters from the other thread should post a comment here describing their approved method to combat the continuing insanity from James Hansen, NASA employee.”
———————————————————————
Blade, we have had a TV campaign against hoon drivers here recently, where the moron burns off from the lights and roars through, scattering the pedestrians, and then sees a pretty girl. Do you know what she does? She waggles the end of her little finger at him, and laughs. It caught on so fast that any form of stupid, hairy chested, breast-beating macho behaviour is now likely to be met with the waggling little finger, which, in case you missed it, is a reference to over-compensation.

I have asked before (but had no reply) what bed wetting has to do with anything – although I do note that boys are overwhelmingly more likely than girls to wet the bed beyond the usual age. As for Queensbury, if you are referring to Oscar Wilde’s boyfriend, are you saying that everyone who disagrees with you is homosexual? Or, has your breast-beating misted over your eyes to the extent that it has detracted from your spelling, so that you mean Queensberry, the originator of the rules of boxing?

Queensberry and his followers are hardly wimps. But apparently they are not macho enough for you, right, Big Guy?

I would like da gubbernmint to confiscate witchdoctor Hansens chicken bone computer models and send him to an alien planet asap. Also please sell all his earthly belongings and use the sales proceeds to refund the public for his psychotic rantings and fraud. If an alien planet is not immediately available, please put him in prison where he belongs for fraud and treason.

Hansen just can’t help himself. He sees himself as the new savior of the planet, apparently, now that Gore has pretty much gone into hiding. But, unfortunately for him, the product he’s hawking is nothing but a dead parrot, a Norwegian Blue, I believe. For his own sanity, or what’s left of it, he really should give it a rest.

Second, his claim about the amount of carbon in Canada’s tar sands (240 gigatons), converted to short tons (some 264 billion short tons), indicates an amount equivalent to 250 plus years of coal consumption in the US. Hansen doesn’t indicate at what time frame this resource would need to be used in order to achieve a 120 ppm increase in CO2 in the atmosphere. In fact, it is highly implausible that such a vast resource could be used so quickly as to achieve that milestone.

Hansen’s op-ed has no basis in science, and NASA should not allow him to use his position to peddle these unscientific claims.

What gives Hansen and his sycophants the right to meddle in the internal affairs of a sovereign country … these are the kinds of actions that lead to war, in this case the passive war has already commenced at White Rock BC.

“If I pay a tax, and then the tax is refunded to me each month, will that change my consumption?”
—–
[…]
Those who use little, will pay little, and their checks would exceed what they paid in.
Those who use a lot, will pay a lot, and their checks will be smaller than what they paid in.

In this scenario, a reasonable person would try to limit how much they use.
___
And the person receiving a cheque exceeding what they paid in may well think they can now afford to use more.

“We should impose a gradually rising carbon fee, collected from fossil fuel companies, then distribute 100 percent of the collections to all Americans on a per-capita basis every month. The government would not get a penny. This market-based approach…” – Hansen

So a government imposed tax is called a “market-based approach”? What nonsense! We have the same doublespeak here in Australia.

There is no tar in Canada’s oil sands. It is a mineral called bitumen. These radical environmentalists like to say “tar” sands as a pejorative, but all it does is highlight their ignorance and desire to keep oil flowing from oppressive regimes like Saudi Arabia, Sudan and other OPEC hellholes.

Matthew said:
“Hansen’s op-ed has no basis in science, and NASA should not allow him to use his position to peddle these unscientific claims.”

True. We all know that the goal of NASA is to make Muslim countries feel good about their fantastic contributions to science.

NASA is now political organization. If they aren’t, then where are the alternative views? Where are the moon colonies? Where are the NASA employees that can intelligently discuss Hanson and request his removal? The fact that no one stands up to Hansen shows that no one is allowed to do so at a politicized NASA.

How come such garbage can be published by a newspaper such as the NYT and can be written by a NASA director is indeed beyond imagination.

“If we turn to these dirtiest of fuels, instead of finding ways to phase out our addiction to fossil fuels, there is no hope of keeping carbon concentrations below 500 p.p.m. — a level that would, as earth’s history shows, leave our children a climate system that is out of their control.”

If Canada proceeds, and we do nothing, it will be game over for the climate.

Thank goodness. Does that mean we won’t hear any more from this delusional man if Canada proceeds and we do nothing?
——————————————————————-
Perhaps Hansen can explain why the U.S. continues to sell coal to China.

Since Hansen has gone apocalyptic on the basis of Mann’s totally discredited Hockey Stick, and the occasional coincidence of increasing temperature and CO2 (and not the just as frequent incidence of decreasing temperature and increasing CO2), I open my “Climate, History and the Modern World” by Dr. H. H. Lamb, open it to one of its many pages I’ve highlighted, and wonder what keeps Hansen and the “natural climate deniers” going. Today I’m looking at a chart on page 142 of “Changes in the height of the upper tree line in two areas in the White Mountains, California and in the Alps in Switzerland and Austria (From work by V. C. La Marche and V. Markgraf)” for the last 6,000 years. The charts show tree lines were much higher than present (meaning it was warmer) for the entire 6,000-year period, and in recent periods both charts clearly show the Medieval Warm Period and Little Ice Age. These trees don’t lie, and they don’t need their rings measured and interpreted as to temperature, moisture, changes in solar exposure, fertilization, &etc. It’s quite simple, really, If a certain type of tree once grew 100 meters above where they now grow, it was warmer then than now. If a certain type of tree once grew 200 to 400 kilometers north of where they grow now, it was warmer then than now. The evidence of the trees’ former habitat is easily determined by stumps and other woody artifacts, which then leads to the comparative ease of determining when they were there through carbon dating. If trees can no longer live somewhere because of changing conditions, they won’t, and have no choice in the matter.
Concerning tree rings, and in particular bristle-cone pines in the White Mountains of California, Professor V. C. La Marche at the Laboratory of Tree Ring Research at my alma mater, University of Arizona, Tucson, has constructed a chart indicating variations of summer warmth and/or its seasonal duration covering the past 5,500 years (see page 141 of Lamb). Unlike Mann’s and others’ studies involving these upper-tree line bristle-cone pines, La Marche’s study shows great variation over the 5,500-year period, with six warming and cooling periods including a very prominent Medieval Warm Period and Little Ice Age, with current warming beginning over 200 years ago.
This is science. It clearly shows that current warming is not unprecedented, but in fact is normal if a bit cooler than previous periods of warming. It also lends great weight to the argument that denying that climate change is normal and has occurred without the aid of humans – or of CO2 instigation, since the AGW believers posit that atmospheric CO2 was stable for this entire period of significant warming and cooling – is supported by a robust body of scientific evidence, far superior to the thin, short time period, model driven body of science that finds an insignificant trace gas rules climate change.
Only true believers like Hansen, not scientists, could hold out against such overwhelming evidence. His article sounds like he is overcome with religious fervor.

The article mentioned Bill McKibben and his “activist group”: 350.org. So I checked that website. Their “250 Update” headline today is titled “We Mean it, Bank of America: No More Money for Coal!” Their claimed 1000 person protest (though just 30-40 appear in their own photo) was directed at “BankvsAmerica” in Charlotte. Apparently B of A invests in the coal industry: “In the last two years, Bank of America has thrown more money at the coal industry than any other bank — more than $4.2 million.”

Now maybe this is a typo and they meant $4.2 billion. But if their protest is over $4.2 million, loaned over two years, isn’t that sort of silly? Isn’t that less that coal industry workers deposit in their Bank of American checking accounts each month? And around the world, $4.2 million just isn’t a lot of dough in the energy industry. According to OilPrice.com: “2011 coal exploration spending in Australia surged by 62 percent, with investment in exploration for new coal deposits reaching $520 million…” http://oilprice.com/Energy/Coal/Green-Australia-Still-Experiencing-Massive-Coal-Boom.html

Lubbock Online discusses BP’s Tiber Prospect deep water oil well in 2009, and reports: “A production platform costs more than $1 billion to build. Drilling a deep-water well can add another $100 million, and if crude is located, it could cost another $50 million to bring the oil to the surface.” And maybe BP can borrow $4.2 million of that from Bank of America, if the firm isn’t too spooked by 350.org activists marching “through the Charlotte streets to the Shareholder meeting, flooding the intersection and halting traffic for a two-hour rally.”

The 350.org post does offer some hope: “While we had an incredible morning of singing, marching, and uniting our struggles on BofA’s doorstep, we wish these protests weren’t necessary in the first place.” The good news?: These protests aren’t necessary in the first place.

The shale gas boom will outcompete coal power over the coming years. Too bad the protesters aren’t cheering shale gas development instead of distracting Bank of America shareholders and frustrating Charlotte drivers.

Since Hansen has written this little missive using his official position one can assume that it is the position of NASA. Frankly, I think that every Canadian who reads Hansen’s rant should both write the US State Dept as well as their own Government. “If Canada proceeds, and we do nothing…” seems to be advocating direct US action into Canadian affairs.

Interesting how Hansen mentioned “Dust Bowl”. Severe drought in seven consecutive years in the 30th produced large dust storms in the midwest coining the phrase dust bowl. Here Hansen speaks of unprecedented climate condition that only could have been caused by the increase of CO2 but clearly we know that those weather or climate events took place before with much lower CO2 levels in the atmosphere.

I resent Hansen’s blithe citation of the warm Pliocene as having any relevance to today’s climatology. It’s well known that the Strait of Panama and the Tethys Sea established a circumglobal warm current that dominated the paleoclimate and ensured a nearly iceless world. Antarctica too was mostly unglaciated, because the Drake Passage was still too shallow for ocean currents. The warm ocean drove CO2 out into the atmosphere, hence the 400 ppm levels, which were consequence, not cause.

Today’s climate is the Interglacial phase of an Icehouse climate regime, greatly differing in fundamental character from the Pliocene regime. The mere difference in ‘average temperature’ completely fails to capture this enormous difference in climate. Even more ludicrous is any references to the Paleocene or Eocene, which were even more different from today.

Since Hansen has written this little missive using his official position one can assume that it is the position of NASA. Frankly, I think that every Canadian who reads Hansen’s rant should both write the US State Dept as well as their own Government. “If Canada proceeds, and we do nothing…” seems to be advocating direct US action into Canadian affairs.

Yeah, we’ll send a whole platoon of one. That “soldier” may very well look like Hansen. You do keep all prisoners, don’t you?

I think that Hansen should get himself arrested more often…. maybe someone can think of some protest/trespass events which would tempt Hansen to get himself arrested for the sake of the grandchildren. How about trespass protests of the “Keystone XL” pipeline route which surely poses a danger to all of humanity? How about inviting Hansen to protest illegally on-site at some evilll tar sands facility?? If Hansen truly believes that humankind is on the brink then he should be willing to get himself arrested a lot more often.

I was in my last year at University in 1988/1989 and the CO2 nonsense came just at the right time for the Universities as their funding had largely dried up because of the oil price crash in 1985/1986.

James Hansen says ” if Canada proceeds and we do nothing, it will be game over for the climate “.
In a peer reviewed paper, Feb. 2012, Andrew Weaver U. Vic., one of Canada’s top climate scientists and no oil sands apologist, concluded that burning all of the recoverable oil from Alberta’s oil sands would increase global average atmospheric temp. by between 0.02 and 0.05 degrees C. Hardly game over for the climate! Dr. Hansen should spend more time keeping up with the climate science literature and less time getting arrested.

“We can say with high confidence that the recent heat waves in Texas and Russia, and the one in Europe in 2003, which killed tens of thousands, were not natural events — they were caused by human-induced climate change.”

“Climate” is an abstraction about changing weather patterns. It, as such, cannot be a causative agent. Only concrete weather events exist and are effects caused by solar input, geological thermal energy, and human fuel use interacting with the the Earth’s surface and atmosphere.
One should always distinguish between concrete objects and abstract objects. The former exist in objective reality and are real and have definitely measurable properties at a particular time. The latter are objects of consciousness and only exist in one’s mind and only have ranges of measurements for their properties.
By not strictly distinguishing between concrete objects and abstract objects one can create whole theories in minds with no connection to reality. Climate theory with climate as causative and not as just an abstraction about weather events is one such lack of distinction which has cause an extreme amount of mischief.

Readers of many of these blogs are warned to avoid “ad hominem attacks” in their comments, but I fear that many do not know what such attacks are. I offer three excellent examples from the standard text on the subject, “The Book of Insults, Ancient and Modern”, by Nancy McPhee (no relation to Christine McFee of the band, Fleetwood Mac). I have found these three examples to be most instructive. Read them aloud; as with all such attacks, the words flow into the ear with great rhetorical intensity, and can only be understood as such.

The first example is found on page 125 of the paperback edition (Penguin, 1978), said by the critic H.L. Mencken of then-President of the United States, Warren Harding (not to be confused with the Yosemite big wall climber with the same name). When I read this the first time, I immediately thought of Professor James Hansen of NASA:

“He writes the worst English that I have ever encountered. It reminds me of a string of wet sponges; it reminds me of tattered washing on the line; it reminds me of stale bean soup, of college yells, of dogs barking idiotically through endless nights. It is so bad that a sort of grandeur creeps into it. It drags itself out of the dark abysm of pish, and crawls insanely up the topmost pinnacle of posh. It is rumble and bumble. It is flap and doodle. It is balder and dash.”

The second example is found on page 131 of the same volume, said by the British politician Benjamin Disraeli of his main rival in the House of Commons, William Gladstone. When I read this, I was reminded of global warming blogger Joseph Romm:

“A sophistical rhetorician, enebriated [sic] with an exuberance of his own verbocity [sic], and gifted with an egotistical imagination, that can at all times command an interminable and inconsistent series of arguments, malign an opponent and glorify himself.”

My third and final example is found on page 140 of the same volume, said by the Canadian politician Sir Francis Bond Head of one of his primary rivals in the Canadian House, William Lyon Mackenzie. This one reminded me of former U.S. Vice President Al Gore:

“He is, without exception, the most notorious liar in all our country. He lies out of every pore of his skin. Whether he is sleeping or waking, on foot or on horseback, talking with his neighbours or writing for a newspaper, a multitudinous swarm of lies, visible, palpable, and tangible, are buzzing and settling about him like flies around a horse in August.”

I do not mean by this exercise to suggest that the aforementioned objects of these attacks actually do deserve such treatment, or that these words are actually descriptive of their character and/or practice. But now readers of this blog can safely say that they have been exposed to ad hominem attacks of great quality, and are now edified with excellent examples of the insult craft. In other words, in our contemporary idiom, “If yuh don’t know, yuh been told”.

Jimbo says:
May 10, 2012 at 11:38 am
What about the recent deaths due to cold in Europe recently? What about the Mongolian cattle catastrophe a few years back? What about the snow in the Amazon, Tunisian sands dusted in snow this past winter and so on…

The nomadic herders in this part of Afghanistan make their winter camp on the south slope of the hills around Kabul. This past December, some of them froze to death in their sleep — according to the locals, this past winter was the coldest since the ’60s.

I’m sorry to say my US friends but this man is a measure of where your countries at the moment. Don’t worry we aren’t much better over here in the UK although Jones hid back under his rock when the scientific light was shone on him, I guess they build them of tougher stuff at NASA.

“Blade, we have had a TV campaign against hoon drivers here recently, where the moron burns off from the lights and roars through, scattering the pedestrians, and then sees a pretty girl. Do you know what she does? She waggles the end of her little finger at him, and laughs. It caught on so fast that any form of stupid, hairy chested, breast-beating macho behaviour is now likely to be met with the waggling little finger, which, in case you missed it, is a reference to over-compensation.

I have asked before (but had no reply) what bed wetting has to do with anything – although I do note that boys are overwhelmingly more likely than girls to wet the bed beyond the usual age. As for Queensbury, if you are referring to Oscar Wilde’s boyfriend, are you saying that everyone who disagrees with you is homosexual? Or, has your breast-beating misted over your eyes to the extent that it has detracted from your spelling, so that you mean Queensberry, the originator of the rules of boxing?

Queensberry and his followers are hardly wimps. But apparently they are not macho enough for you, right, Big Guy?”

Johanna, I’m operating under the assumption that you are a lady, as such this “macho, big guy” (how’d you know?) rarely if ever will consider smacking down even the most naively liberal female concern troll. Hey, it’s how I was raised so long ago.

Having said that, how the heck did you manage to read my comment, get the particulars wrong and still somehow avoid the glaringly obvious question: All the *Queensberry* bed-wetters from the other threadshould post a comment here describing their approved method to combat the continuing insanity from James Hansen, NASA employee.

Perhaps you can go over and meet him and talk him to death or persuade him with your devastatingly effective non-aggressive advertising campaign? ;-)

“Blade, we have had a TV campaign against hoon drivers here recently, where the moron burns off from the lights and roars through, scattering the pedestrians, and then sees a pretty girl. Do you know what she does? She waggles the end of her little finger at him, and laughs. It caught on so fast that any form of stupid, hairy chested, breast-beating macho behaviour is now likely to be met with the waggling little finger, which, in case you missed it, is a reference to over-compensation.

I have asked before (but had no reply) what bed wetting has to do with anything – although I do note that boys are overwhelmingly more likely than girls to wet the bed beyond the usual age. As for Queensbury, if you are referring to Oscar Wilde’s boyfriend, are you saying that everyone who disagrees with you is homosexual? Or, has your breast-beating misted over your eyes to the extent that it has detracted from your spelling, so that you mean Queensberry, the originator of the rules of boxing?

Queensberry and his followers are hardly wimps. But apparently they are not macho enough for you, right, Big Guy?”

Johanna, I’m operating under the assumption that you are a lady, as such this “macho, big guy” (how’d you know?) rarely if ever will consider smacking down even the most naively liberal female concern troll. Hey, it’s how I was raised so long ago.

Having said that, how the heck did you manage to read my comment, get the particulars wrong and still somehow avoid the glaringly obvious question: “All the *Queensberry* bed-wetters from the other threadshould post a comment here describing their approved method to combat the continuing insanity from James Hansen, NASA employee.”

Perhaps you can go over and meet him and talk him to death or persuade him with your devastatingly effective non-aggressive advertising campaign? ;-)

Russ R. says:
May 10, 2012 at 10:15 am
“…I’ll happily accept a check for all the tar sand that I don’t mine this year. In fact, next year I’ll make a committed effort to double my non-output, if I can have twice as big an incentive payment.”

Reminds me of the EU ‘Common Agricultural Policy’, a nice scam that saw the EEC (as it was then) pay European farmers unrealistic prices for produce that no one wanted, to stop them going bust. This prevented the markets finding the natural solution to agricultural overproduction, and ensured that people were kept in unproductive employment at the expense of those who were actually productive. A secondary effect was the amassing of huge stocks of wheat, butter, wine and olive oil in storage that became expensive to keep and couldn’t be released onto the markets since it would have provoked a collapse in commodity prices. To address this, they started paying farmers NOT to produce food! Land that had once been useless such as swamps, was bought up – suddenly it had value since it could be ‘set aside’ – the farmer would be paid not to grow crops on it. I recall that some hill farmers disposed of their sheep and planted beet that was unharvestable, the profit from not harvesting beet was greater than that from rearing sheep. Greek and Italian olive growers were paid not to harvest their crop. When the EU comissioned a satellite photographic survey of European olive groves, they were unable to find a large proportion of them – they probably never existed.
Good luck to the Canadians with this one, I suggest that they should ‘find’ much more tar sand than they originally thought.

ConfusedPhoton says:
May 10, 2012 at 8:53 am
The end might be nigh according to hansen but he and his wife still seem to manage first class air travel when spreading the word of doom! Funny that!
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The Hansen’s and Gores of the world never follow their own policies and reduce their own carbon footprint. They believe that since they are on a noble cause, their rules don’t apply to them. It is us, the sinners that need to repent.

The way they justify this is by saying that their policies will reduce carbon overall, thus they are justified in personally producing more carbon. By the same argument, we can all increase our own carbon footprint, so long as our policies are to reduce them. It isn’t about what we actually do, it is about what we say we want to do.

What we have are preachers’ calling for morality, so they can have their way with the flock. Calling on the rest of us to sacrifice so they can live high on the hog and enjoy the good life.

The average citizen of the earth emits only a small fraction of the carbon pollution that Hansen and Gore emit. Yet, in the minds of Hansen and Gore, the problem is everyone else.

I think the people like Hansen who look consistent in their CAGW cult ideology are the least of the IPCC supporters to be concerned about. The Hansen’s of the climate scientist community are easily identified as stepping straight toward collectivism and have shown openly a desire for more authoritarianism (i.e quasi-totalitarianism); they are completely out in the open and can be clearly highlighted as intellectual ‘damaged goods’ to reasonable people. I think it is because of Hansen and his fellow travelers that the focus in the public discourse has shifted to a balanced skeptical position away from IPCC centric CAGWism.

My thinking lately is on looking into developing a hypothesis about whether the major risk to fundamental liberty in democratic countries is not the Hansen-like ideologists but rather the IPCC centric CAGW scientists/supporters who hold a Pragmatist philosophic ( see Pragmatist work of philosophers John Dewey, Charles Sanders Peirce and William James) position on climate science. Current status of developing my hypothesis is that I am doing research on whether the Pragmatist philosophy (explicitly or by cultural adsorption) has significantly influenced the individuals who have named themselves Lukewarmers wrt; 1) the IPCC’s assessment of warming the Earth-atmospheric system by CO2 from by burning fossil fuels, and 2) the magnitude and direction of the impact on life on Earth.

My ‘hypothesis-in-the-making, that a Lukewarmer position informed by Pragmatism holds the highest risk to fundamental liberty in democratic countries, is one I will be focused on for several months. Will keep you posted.

JohnWho says:
May 11, 2012 at 5:57 am
I disagree – we would all be better off if he spent less time on “climage science” literature and more time getting arrested. LOL
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I don’t know, really. He would probably spoil other inmates with his views.

On the other hand, the criminals there might downgrade him to a common thief, rapist or murderer, which would be good for the mankind.

mfo says: May 10, 2012 at 9:57 am
Freedom of speech is fine but someone using their status as a senior government employee seems to be insinuating hostility towards the US President in an election year. Can Hanson be entirely sane?
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It has often been said, even before Obama, that Hanson has political protection at a high level…
I suspect that the President won’t be pleased to hear that Hansen is causing all those believers to think that he, Obama, doesn’t care about the environment. Not with an election coming.
Presidential disapproval has a habit of bearing down. Isn’t Hansen already past the normal retiring age?

It is outrageous that this man still has his job. Unfortunately stupid is incurable. Is he stupid? or just part of a conspiracy. There are several levels of stupid operating here. #1 WE PUT UP WITH THIS GARBAGE AS IF WE HAVE TO RESPECT, RESPOND AND RATIONALIZE IT.. LET’S GET BACK TO SCIENCE! #2 THE CO2 TAX AND WEALTH REDISTRIBUTION GAME HAS BEEN THUROUGHLY EXPOSED AND NO ONE IS CALLING IT CONSPIRACY AND TREASON. WHY NOT? #3 PERFECTLY INTELLEGENT PEOPLE ARE ARGUING WITH A CONSPIRATOR OR VAACUOUS OLD MAN AS IF STUPID IS GOING TO HAVE AN EPIPHANY OR THE CONSPIRATOR IS GOING TO TURN HIMSELF IN. #4 THIS MAN’S MOTIVATION IS RECOGNIZEABLE AS POLITICS NOT SCIENCE.